January 27th is week TWENTY-TWO! Holy Cow! On January 27th, 1956 "Heartbreak Hotel" became Elvis Presley's first million-selling single. The lyrics were based on a report supposedly in The Miami Herald about a man who had destroyed all his identity papers and jumped to his death from a hotel window, leaving a suicide note with the single line, "I walk a lonely street". In 2016, an article in Rolling Stone magazine suggested that the story in reality originated from a report about a painter and petty criminal, Alvin Krolik, whose marriage had failed and who wrote a partial autobiography including the line "This is the story of a person who walked a lonely street." Whatever the inspiration, this song is a classic, and one of my favorite Elvis tunes. On January 27th, 2020, there was heartbreak aplenty tonight at club. For yours truly. I lost the first 7 games. I narrowly avoided the string of pearls, thanks to Tom Goeschel and Ernie Hodgson, who felt badly for me :) Thanks Fellas! But dang, the TERRIBLE cards! I changed pegs after every loss. I did a backwards lap around my chair. THREE of us drew a total of FIVE fences on my card. I used no fewer than six pens. I shifted my table detritus from one side of the board to the other. I even tried dealing RIGHT HANDED (which was wicked hard, by the way). Nope. Not my night. As they say.... Oh Well. Liz Henderson, on the other hand, had a spectacular night. She earned 17 points which put her over 1000 GRPs; yep, another member of the BRONZE club! Way to go, Liz! If you're keeping count, that's TWO folks this season leveling up. The next closest to leveling up is Jeff Raynes, who is 125 away from his gold. With light attendance, only the top four took home cash, so the lone 12 and one of the 13s didn't score prize money. All three teams totaled 19, so extra math was needed to sort out the winners. Third team went to Jerro Gooden (12) and Pete Amacher (7) Second team was John Medeiros (11) and Bernard Whitfield (8) And first team was Larry Phifer (13) and Kristy Haught (6) Here are this week's results: Larry continues to dominate the field, and has pulled further away from second place. Liz's win this week brought her into the top 10 for the season, knocking out my dear ol' dad. Club Top Ten is below: Finally, we all send Russ Perkins our healing and positive thoughts; he's not been feeling well. Have a great week everyone; see ya'll Monday! ~ Jennifer
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Week twenty-one coincided with Martin Luther King, Jr. Day. Dr. King was the most important voice of the American civil rights movement, which worked for equal rights for all. He was famous for using nonviolent resistance to overcome injustice, and he never got tired of trying to end segregation laws. He also did all he could to make people realize that "all men are created equal." Because of his great work, in 1964 King received the Nobel Peace Prize -- the youngest person ever to receive this high honor. He was assassinated in Memphis, Tennessee, when he was just 39 years old. President Ronald Regan signed the Martin Luther King Jr. Day holiday into law in 1983, and it was first observed as a national holiday in January, 1986. The holiday is traditionally celebrated by looking for ways to give back to the community. This week, 23 of us came together and celebrated with friends, laughter, cribbage, and Girl Scout Cookies. Fran Ward won the night with an almost perfect card. Brian Wilson kept Fran from obtaining the elusive Grand Slam. Still, an 18/8 isn't a bad night. Only four players earned GRPs, meaning that TWO 11-cards came into the money this week. Third team went to John Medeiros (10) and Ernie Hodgson (8) Second team went to Jeff Seidenstein (11) and Megan Player (9) First team went to Jennifer Johnson (10) and David Lambeth (10) Full results are below: One of the GRP earners was Larry Phifer, so he extended his lead this week. Fran's 18 bumps him up into the top 10, knocking yours truly out (sniffle). Current standings, through 21 weeks, for your reading pleasure: I hope everyone has a great week; see ya'll on Monday! ~ Jennifer Did you know that January 13, 1794 is when Congress changed the US flag to 15 stars & 15 stripes? The Flag Act of 1794 was signed into law by President George Washington, and changed the design of the flag to accommodate the admission into the Union of the states of Vermont and Kentucky. It provided for fifteen stripes as well as fifteen stars. This would be the only official flag of the United States not to have thirteen stripes. The very first American flag, established in 1777, had “thirteen stripes, alternate red and white; that the union be thirteen stars, white in a blue field, representing a new Constellation." After 1794, when the US was growing, it was clear that adding stripes for each new state was going to make our flag a blanket. Maybe even a duvet. So, in 1818, President Monroe signed an Act that would restructure the flag to have 13 stripes and one star for each state, to be added to the flag on the 4th of July following the admission of each new state. The stars were rearranged in June, 1912 (six horizontal rows of eight each, a single point of each star to be upward) and January, 1959 (seven rows of seven stars each, staggered horizontally and vertically), with the final re-configuration being signed into law On August 21, 1959 by President Eisenhower. The stars were aligned last night for two of our guests, Chris Trent, coming to us from the Reidsville club. He and his daughter bookended the cash prizes last night; Chris in the front, and Taylor in the back. This was Taylor's first foray in to tournament cribbage, and she did great! Robert Smothers and Henry Douglass were the other guests last night, but didn’t take home any cash. The stars were definitely misaligned for Andy Wagner, who not only didn’t score GRPs, but got handed a double-skunk (whoops). I sat next to Andy – he had TERRIBLE cards that game (clearly) and pegging was very hard to come by. He did help me out by drawing a fence on my card after 6 losses in a row (!!) which allowed me to win my last three games. Word of advice folks, ALWAYS have a civil engineer build your fences. The top six players won money, meaning that Taylor's 11 points got her in. Third team went to Fran Ward (9) and Pete Amacher (9) Second team went to Kristy Haught (9) and John Medeiros (10) and First team went to Jeff Seidenstein (10) and Brian Wilson (11) The full results from last night can be found below: Our Fearless Leader Catherine gained one point on Larry, and widened the gap between second and third places. Larry still has a substantial lead over the rest of the pack. Our weekly top-ten is below: See ya'll next Monday, everyone!
~ Jennifer Sung with terrible Dean-o accent: When three moons In the Sky Have been found By this guy It’s….Gallileo Yep, on January 7, 1610 Galileo Galilei discovered the first three moons of Jupiter: Io, Europa & Ganymede. A fourth moon, Callisto, was also discovered this year, but on a different day. Io is the fourth-largest moon in the solar system, has the highest density of all of them, and has the lowest amount of water of any known astronomical object in the Solar System. With over 400 active volcanoes, Io is also the most geologically active object in the Solar System. Europa is the smallest of the four Galilean moons orbiting Jupiter, and the sixth-closest to the planet of all the 79 known moons of Jupiter. It is also the sixth-largest moon in the Solar System. Ganymede is the largest and most massive of the Solar System's moons. The ninth largest object in the Solar System, it is the largest without a substantial atmosphere. That concludes the educational portion of the blog post :) Now, on to what you REALLY came to learn. Roughly a third of players earned GRPs this week – we’re getting better as a group! But alas, some of the 12s didn’t come into place money. Third team went to Andy Wagner (6) and Luther Lanier (11) Second team went to Larry Phifer (10) and Jennifer Johnson (12) And first team went to Joe Greiner (11) and Kristy Haught (12) The week’s results are below: With Larry Phifer being a gentleman, and only scoring 10 this week, a few players were able to sneak a little closer to top-of-the-heap. But, with a 45-point lead over second place, I don’t think Larry’s sweating it yet. Second place is very tight, with four people (Frank Abernathy, Kristy Haught, and Cathy Perkins) all within 5 points of each other. The top-10 in the club is listed below (look who snuck in to 10th place!) Also, for those of you who are “down” with Bernard Whitfield, he earned 12 GRPs 😊 I leave it to you to sort out who owes whom $5. A good number of us are heading to Williamsburg this weekend; good luck to one and all! ~Jennifer This holiday originated thousands of years ago in ancient Babylon, celebrated as an eleven day festival on the first day of spring. During this time, many cultures used the sun and moon cycle to decide the “first” day of the year. It wasn’t until Julius Caesar implemented the Julian calendar that January 1st became the common day for the celebration. All over the world, starting with the small island nations of Tonga, Samoa, and Kiribati, people celebrate the coming of the new year. Spaniards celebrate New Year’s Day with the custom of eating twelve grapes, each eaten at a clock-stroke at midnight. Greeks celebrate New Year’s Day with card games and feasting. At midnight, the lights are turned off, followed by the Basil’s Pie, which contains a coin. Whoever gets the piece of pie containing the coin wins luck for the next year. In the Philippines, celebrations are very loud, believing that the noise will scare away evil beings. However you celebrated the coming of the new year, I hope you were surrounded by loved ones. On Monday night, we had 24 folks come out for New-Year’s-Eve-Eve fun :) More than 25% of attendees earned points, with both Cathy Perkins and Luther Lanier earning 15 points. Cathy’s 137 spread, however, put her in first place. Andy Wagner took third with 14 points, and John Medeiros, Dave Lambeth, Tom Goeschel, and Dot Davis all earned 12. Dot’s 12-card didn’t earn her place money. However, it was good enough to be (and draw) an excellent partner, and earn a team prize. Third Team went to Jennifer Johnson (10) and Glenn McMahon (8) Second Team went to Jerry Gooden (10) and Bernard Whitfield (10) And First Team went to Dot Davis (12) and Pete Amacher (10) Full results are below: With another points-earning week, our Fearless Leader is creeping up on the Current Leader. Is the season long enough (and Larry’s run of cards bad enough) for her to catch up? Time will tell. Top ten in the club is shown below: Happy New Year to you! I hope this year brings you the warmth of love, and illuminates your path of life towards a positive direction. A journey of a thousand miles must begin with a single step. See ya’ll on Monday! ~ Jennifer |
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